Motivating Your Teen | Chore Routines

Getting your teens to help out around the house.

I am now going to share with you what has worked for our busy family being a parent of two teenage daughters I know first-hand how challenging it can be to get them to help out around the house from time to time. Not only does it help us out it is also teaching them a little bit of responsibility and teaching them life skills they need when they leave home to be able to fend for themselves.

Rember to be patient, it will not happen overnight – It takes 21 days to form a habit

Motivating your teen

Talk openly and honestly with your teen about the chores which you would like for them to be responsible for, explain why they need to help around the house. Constantly nagging makes them less likely to carry out the simplest of task you may have asked them to do. Around the house, will only leave yourself feeling frustrated and your teen angry, as will asking them to do a job straight out of the blue.

Set a deadline for the tasks to be carried out, giving them full flexibility when they carry out their tasks set for them.

Give them complete responsibility for the task, don’t tell them how you think they should be carried out or where to start.

Sometimes it’s not down to the fact that your teen is not necessarily motivated to carry out these simple day to day tasks. Teens have a lot going on hormones; it could be school down to revising for exams, homework, maybe their friendship circle making it very easy for them to be distracted.

Help them to remember their chores

Top tips – Set up Apple family this will ping little reminder on their mobile devices, this way you don’t need to nag. It gives you full control when and how often they get reminded; it can be set up for each family member.

Trello app is a great alternative to apple family.

Lead by example including yourself in the chore list, so your teen sees you carrying out and marking off your tasks when they have been completed.

Phrases you will hear A LOT:

I’ll do it later

I’ll do it in a minute

It’s not fair

The first thing that will go through your teens head when being asked to carry out a task will be – What is in it for them, why should I?!

“You need to do what I have asked you to do, to do what it is you would like to be doing!”

Rewarding your teen

I provide my teen with what they need, not everything they want. I am teaching my child a good work ethic by rewarding them with spends for carrying out their chores for them to save and buy those things that they want. If you don’t want to reward your teen with spends, you can plan an exciting family trip out. If the tasks are not complete with your time frame, then there is no reward. Most importantly I always like to thank my teen when all our tasks are complete.